Well, that was something!

When I told you all that it might be a while before I updated again, I had no idea how long it would really be. My Oracle upgrade did not go as planned, and we never made it to Charlotte last week. I thought about sharing the whole ordeal with you, but suffice to say I worked over 52 hours on the upgrade last week, including a 36-hour stretch without sleep, not counting eight hours of travel time to and from the ATL. So I didn't have much time or clarity of thought to blog last week.

Of course, all that is old news and this week we're on to fresh challenges. My boss has asked me to come up with a vision statement for my group, and informed me today that we are going to do things differently next year. I think my response was about five seconds of silence, followed by, "Okay."

That reminds me of a story that we like to tell about Microsoft. Several years ago, we were audited by Microsoft and they asked us to document all of our software licensing. Long story short, we ended up spending lots of money on software, including purchasing their brand new Software Assurance on much of our server software. Three years later, we were visited by Microsoft reps again, this time selling us on the benefits of continuing our SA contracts. My boss and I had talked prior to their visit about how we had spent so much money on SA for all of our SQL Servers, and that since Microsoft had not delivered on their promised upgrade to SQL Server during those three years, we were going to confront the Microsoft guys about it and see what they had to say for themselves. The conversation went something like this:

Us - "You know, we bought Software Assurance for our SQL Servers because it was a better deal than relicensing every one of them, provided that there was a new version of SQL Server."
MS - "Okay."
Us - "So it's really a ripoff to have paid 60% on top of the software cost to get an upgrade that was never delivered."
MS - "Okay."
Us - "Now you're asking us to re-up for SA, and we can't see why it's a good investment, given the fact that we haven't seen any new versions of any of the software for which we purchased SA in the first place."
MS - "Okay."

Every time we made a statement about how we felt abused and misused by their licensing extortion, they acknowledged that we had spoken without admitting they had done anything wrong, or even attempting to make a case for SA. It was really mind blowing, and yet funny at the same time. So now every time someone says something to me for which I have no response, my response is "Okay." Don't tell me that Microsoft is good for nothing!

So anyway, my boss explained further that I shouldn't worry and it was going to be good for everyone. I have no idea what that means. And the cynic in me is already struggling with the whole vision statement assignment. But, I'm going to do my best to try to synopsize our goals in a short, visionary fashion.